DEP commissioner initiates suspension of permit for transmission line

PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • August 13, 2021

Maine’s top environmental regulator is poised to suspend the permit for a controversial, high-voltage transmission line following a judge’s decision earlier this week nullifying a crucial lease needed to route the project through state-owned lands. In a letter sent Thursday, Commissioner Melanie Loyzim of the Maine Department of Environmental Protection notified officials with New England Clean Energy Connect that she is beginning the process to potentially suspend the company’s permit. Loyzim noted that, following a Superior Court justice’s ruling on Tuesday, the company no longer has a lease for a 0.9-mile stretch of corridor route through public reserved lands in West Forks Plantation and Johnson Mountain Township.